Guinea's President and Prosecutor
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Guinea's president and prosecutor SENEGAL use of special, summary courts for sentencing MALI GUINEA.BISSAU • political prisoners B u Koundara torture of political prisoners to extract Lani 'confessions' GUINEA Dabol• use of the death penalty and the high death rate Kindla Kankan paranah among political prisoners Conakry ATIANTIC OCEAN HARSH CONDITIONS OF IMPRISONMENT Etemwo Conditions of imprisonment are reported to be very SIERRA LEONE severe in all Guinea's prison camps, especially at Wzirkork Camp Boiro (in Conakry) and Kindia (about 100 kilometres inland from Conakry). Among the worst LIBERIA aspects of prison conditions are: IVORY Momvis COAST Overcrowded cells - there are sometimes 12 'Those who wish to think he is dead are free to do so prisoners in poorly ventilated cells intended for and those who want to think he is alive are free to three or four people do so'. Fily Cissako, Guinean Minister for Foreign Affairs, Food and water are only supplied in minimal June 1977. quantities. Prisoners often receive only one or two litres of water each day, which is insufficient for drinking, let alone washing Is Diallo Telli dead or alive? This is the sort of purposes. Many prisoners suffer from diseases question that is asked about prisoners of conscience caused by lack of vitamins (beri-beri and scurvy, in Guinea (Conakry). Telli, the former Secretary General of the Organisation of African Unity (GAU), for example) and protein (kwashiorkor). Other Minister of Justice in Guinea and Guinean prisoners have become blind or deaf, or else are unable to walk as a result of malnutrition. representative at the United Nations, was arrested in July 1976 on charges of being involved in an alleged plot against President Sgkou Tourg. In January 1977 Hygiene and sanitation - provisions for both are grossly inadequate. Prisoners are only rarely Amnesty International received reports that he had allowed out of their cells to wash (reportedly been executed in November 1976. M. Cissako's only every three to four weeks in one prison). enigmatic remark must raise doubts about Telli's There is no water-borne sewage system in the fate. prisons. Diallo Telli's name can be mentioned because he is a public figure; Amnesty International does not, Health - most prisons are not served by a doctor however, 'adopt' prisoners of conscience in Guinea - or even by medical auxiliaries. Almost no medical as it does in other parts of the world - since to do treatment is available to prisoners apart from a so could bring retribution upon them. Certainly the few vitamin pills on special occasions. The lack Guinean authorities have always refused to answer of medical facilities has resulted in a very enquiries about the fate of particular political high death rate among prisoners suffering from a prisoners. To avoid causing harm to those it wishes variety of illnesses such as malaria, chronic to help, Amnesty International calls upon the Guinean dysentery and skin infections. In the six months authorities to institute improvements in the human between March and September 1974, 253 deaths were rights situation of those imprisoned. reported from one section of Camp Boiro which usually holds about 700 prisoners. Among human rights violations in Guinea which cause Amnesty concern are: Visits - prisoners are not permitted any visits, even from their close families. The Guinean *prison conditions which do not accord with the authorities encourage prisoners' families to United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the break all ties with prisoners, and some prisoners' Treatment of Prisoners wives are even reported to have been forced to re-marry. sprolonged detention without trial PROLONGED DETENTION WITHOUTTRIAL In 1977 opposition to Sekou Tour& became more open Many prisoners in Guinea have been held for periods than in earlier years and demonstrations took place of up to eight years without receiving any form of in most of Guinea's major towns. The demonstrators trial. Detainees cannot contest the grounds of their were mostly women, angry with the government's detention, and no independent body exists tc re, 74am economic policies, which had led to a critical food detention orders. Ironically, the Guinean shortage. constitution specifically prohibits arbitrary arrest At one demonstration in Conakry, soldiers were and detention without trial, and only in February ordered to open fire on a crowd of women, and many 1978 The Guinea government ratified the Inter were killed. Covenant on Civil and Political Ri hts which also Women are only one section of the community which guarantees the right to be tried without undue delay. suffers in Guinea and this not only because they bear the brunt of the government's economic policy but also because they have achieved high posts in USEOFSPECIALSUMMARYCOURTSFORSEWENMNG POUTWALPRMONERS political life. Their success has meant that there Diallo Telli was not accorded any proper form of are a large number of women political prisoners. Many trial. Tape-recorded 'confessions of guilt were members of Guinea's 150-man National Assembly and of broadcast over Conakry radio. Since 1971, most the ruling Guinea Democratic Party are among those political prisoners who have received a form of trial imprisoned. Members of Guinea's diplomatic corps have effectively been condemned by a small commission have also been singled out for arrest. The teaching which meets in Conakry's main prison camp, and one of profession has been the object of President Sou Tour-6's repression since soon after Independence Guinea's harshest, Camp Boiro. The commission consists of several relatives and close advisers of Sekou Toure when, in 1961, he claimed to have uncovered a,'plot' by some teachers to overthrow him. Students who and is chaired by his brother Ismael Toure. The demonstrated in 1970 were arrested, accused of commission interrogates prisoners, demanding that they 'imperialism' and imprisoned for several years. In 'confess' their guilt, and if they refuse orders them 1973 other students were detained for organising to be tortured. 'subversion'. Church leaders, both Muslim and Roman Catholic, have received their share of repression TORTUREOFPOUTWALPRMONERSTOEXTRACT from the Guinean authorities. TONFESMOW 'Confessions' from real or suspected opponents of the Although many of Guinea's political prisoners have government are commonly used as proof of guilt. been well-known public figures, the majority of those Consistent reports from former prisoners indicate detained without trial are believed to be ordinary that they are extracted by means of torture. Torture workers and farmers. THEY ALL NEED YOUR HELP. occurs not only with tacit government approval but, according to eye-witnesses, with the active PRESIDENT SEKOU TCCRi AS PReSECUIOR participation of senior officials, including Ismael In 1971 the entire National Assurtb1-7 wa2; turnc,-; into a supreTe Tours. revolutionary tribunal . It subsequently passed al sentence The only evidence presentea Methods of torture are reported to include: against the pilsoners. who were not allowed to appear in court. consisted of tept—recordec the application of electric shocks to the head, Is ael ToLre 'confessions'. limbs and genitals severe beating with fists, sticks and whips burning with cigarettes immersing prisoners upside-down in water until they lose consciousness No exact figures are available for the number of prisoners who have died as a direct consequence of torture. Former prisoners suggest that more than a hundred may have died this way. USEOFTHEDEATHPENALTYANDTHEHIGHDEATHRATE AMONGPOUTICALPRMONERS Guinea retains the use of the death penalty, and Amnesty International is concerned by the large numbers of executions of political prisoners. They are frequently sentenced to death by summary courts, and allowed no opportunity to appeal against their sentences. They are usually executed within a few days of being sentenced. Was Diallo Telli executed in November 1976, or is he still alive in prison in Guinea? Maybe he was not executed but is, nevertheless, dead. Reports from Guinea's prison camps suggest that hundreds of prisoners have been killed, by being either shot. tortured or starved to death. Large numbers of prisoners have died as a results of being deprived of food and water for weeks on end. Starvation is used to weaken all political prisoners when they are first arrested- it seems also to be used to kill prisoners without formally sentencing them to death and publishing the sentence. BACKGROUNDTOIMPRMONMENT Between 3,000 and 4,000 Guineans are reported to be held in prisons and camPs - of which there are at least 15 - and the majority of them have never received any form of trial. Reporter; Since Independence in 1958, political life in in Goin,d Guinea has been disrupted by a series of alleged conspiracies against the government. On at least fifteen occasions President Sgkou Touré has claimed that his Guinean opponents have been plotting his overthrow and murder. The public disclosure of these conspiracies has been followed by waves of arrests, sometimes numbering more than 1,000. The most important of these 'conspiracies' recently was that in 1976 in which Diallo Telli was implicated. The President revealed that a 14-year-old boy had tried to shoot him while he was on a visit to amne Conakry's Polytechnique. In the months after this attempted assassination, Sékou Tourg laid the blame international on one particular section of the community - the is an international human rights organisation which Foulah people, who make up one third of the country's campaigns for the release of Prisoners of Conscience, population. Many Foulah were arrested, including two provided they have not used or advocated violence, government ministers. throughout the world, from Argentina to the USSR, from South Africa to Guinea. 116 countries are listed Many other people have also been arrested since 1971 in Amnesty International's latest Annual Report. Of and accused of a variety of political offences: the figure of 500,000, which is Amnesty International's estimate of prisoners of conscience detained at any attempting to leave Guinea illegally one time, 1,500 (approximately) were released in 1977.